Doctors ask court for permission to turn off pregnant woman's life-support machine

The High Court will hear legal submissions this morning in the case of a brain-dead pregnant woman who is being kept on life support.

Doctors who have been keeping the woman on life support in the hope of saving her 17-week-old foetus have pleaded in court to be permitted to turn off the machines because their treatment was becoming horrific and could not end in a successful birth.